Saturday, September 26, 1998

Intelligence and Survival

I don’t know how much sense this makes, but I just thought something that I thought worthy of recording: “It’s no wonder that intelligence doesn’t pass in direct lines; if it did, we’d just band together and kill the others”—or outperform them, or what not. Could this be true? I mean, you can’t do away with the intelligent ones—you need them. But too many together, especially related, is a danger to everyone else. But why didn’t it happen, then? We are all somewhat intelligent; obviously it’s a survival trait for us. But only a few are very intelligent; this has always been true, and is still true in apes. Why didn’t the smart ones beget more smart ones and become dominant? Are lots of smart people self-destructive? This is very important.